We Must Make It A Better Season Than Last Season

Another batch of players have reported back to training at Benton today as they get checked out and look forward to their first training session together as a group tomorrow.

Vurnon Anita – on the bike yesterday Vurnon Anita was signed from Ajax for £6.7M on August 15th last year, so he didn’t have a pre-season at Newcastle, and while Vurnon made 37 appearances for Newcastle last season with 27 starts, he still found it difficult as he adjusted to the demands of the Premier league.

But we are looking forward to seeing a much more accomplished Anita this coming season, and after returning from a vacation in the Caribbean, he had this to say on the Newcastle web-site:

“I don’t like pre-season, but it’s necessary to get fit and to build stamina for the whole season,” “It’s very important. I don’t like it but I do it with pleasure because I know it gives me everything for the future and for the whole season.”

“Over the summer I make sure that I don’t eat too much and things, because you only make it harder for yourself in pre-season then, so I took care.”

“I went to the gym and I ran so I’m ready for pre-season and I’m looking forward to seeing everybody on Saturday, to have a chat and a laugh with each other and then start with the training again.”

“It’ll be good to play games again and see where we are as a team, so I’m looking forward to it and we must make it a better season than last season.”

“We have a good group and everybody is one year further with each other, so that’s also good and now we must build to do a good performance.” “When I came, everything was new but now it’s more normal and I’m looking forward to it.”

With James Perch leaving for Wigan earlier this week, Anita will get more chances to play in the first team, and he’s a player who can play in either full back position and in central midfield too.

And Vurnon is a very good technical player, as are most players who graduate from the famous Ajax Youth Academy.

We expect Anita to be a lot better in his second season at Newcastle, after adjusting to the pace and pressures of the Premier League last term.

Hopefully Pardew realised last season just didn’t work and he has sat down with senior/key players and discussed a way to get more out of them.

Football is so archaic sometimes. Managers shouldn’t be embarrassed to seek help from senior players. Other sports are much more open to communication and having a greater say come from the players on the pitch…..after all they are the ones who will know best as they are playing.

Trouble for me is that we appear to have a core of a very talented and exciting team. You jot down those names on paper and offer it to any manager below the top 4 in the Prem and I think they would be reasonably pleased to have them. Our probem is that Pardew has been like a 5-year-old kid with a 16+ years and up jigsaw – he hasn’t shown the ability to assemble it. I used to excuse it with the injury list thing, but in his level of professionalism, that is one of the difficulties he should be able to account for. I have no idea why players like Anita can’t get a decent run in a side, or how HBA is not a regular (I mean how slow was his recovery to fitness last time?).

To have a better season this year we really needed a tactical change, sorry Alan, if you start the season the same way as you finished the last, JFK will be interim manager faster than you can count the interest on an overdue Wonga loan. And then we ARE knacked.

Sage – yes mate I saw that too, very uncomfortable and embarrassing viewing on the pitchside playing some reasonably drab teams that looked like Real Madrid in comparison to our passing ability. But it cant be lack of basic skills can it? It would be ludicrous to suggest these players are at international level but cant play keep-ball. It has much more to do with awareness and positioning, and if you play lads out of their natural positions and insist on varying their roles too much, connecting play becomes disjointed. Players need to string runs of games together for a decent stretch to become aware of each other’s movement, then things like the ball being passed behind a man, or the long ball (Kebab) to a runner who isn’t actually there will dry up. OK a lot of that was down to the injuries, but Pardew could have played a stable core of players in their natural positions a lot more than he did.

I think what Sage said about getting a few key players together with the manager to sort out a core to build a team on is important. Naturally the Captain should be one of those, and to an extent the defence was built around Colo last term, but injury in that line really did us in. I would suppose Cabs and Sissoko are the pair in midfield and then if we are going to stand by Cisse, he is the focal point up front. There’s just 4 players who could get their heads together with the manager, problem is, if Alan’s legendary arrogance is only half true, that’s why last season never happened.

Pardew plays his favourites such as Jonas, you cant afford to do that, Anita sat on the bench when the likes of Gosling were brought on. Obviously doesn’t rate Anita. My big worry is players bought by JFK and Carr not fancied by Pardew, who has sole responsibility for team selection(apparently) and refusing to play them. This situation makes a mockery of the new set up. I am not a fan of Broken Brain, he is not a decent manager.

Belfast (shut up btw) if we start off badly I think our heads will be down for the season because the players will KNOW that it will be last season all over again. Then the January window will look one of SD’s clearout days.

How can you not rate Anita, though? Its not fair to judge him on the rare showings he has had, played in all sorts of weird situations, never getting a decent run in a fixed system. The way he has been utilised is a sure fire way to turn an excellent player into a Gosling-type lost character.

If Anita was played consistently in the right system, I think he would start running the show after a while. Great energy, good quick passer and likes to make things happen. At least he appears to be that way 🙂

Back after a long time just reading peoples comments. I personally feel so disheartened by what Mike Ashley and the club are doing. We just seem to be in no position to buy any quality players, and lets he honest who would want to come and play for Newcastle United at the moment. I live in grimsby so when I am able to attend games I want to see the passion, commitment from all of the players and staff associated with the club. This re appointment of Kinnear is absolute ridicules, anyone can see that this is not in the clubs best interests. And when the owner doesn’t back the man he has just bought in with buying a player and not supporting it is a joke. I am not generally a negative person but can anyone actually see any light at the end of the tunnel. I will continue to support my team through thick and thin after all this is what we do being a Newcastle United supporter.

Gosling, perch etc are being shipped out, purely to allow for bigi and Anita to get more game time. JK has made the call and is moving awat from this ‘pardew plays his favourites’ thing. That was clearly the case last season, but if nothing else, JK will put boot to ass and not allow this to happen.

Also word is we are ensuring we are clued up regarding Remy and his impending court appearance before committing to any kind of deal.

Our club is starting to turn into a joke… Why haven’t we seen any movement in the transfer window yet? Surely it’s important to get the new players involved in pre-season training? We have lack of ambition wrote all over us. I’m not saying we should go out an spend a fortune and not saying we need loads of players but everyone can see we’re desperate for strikers

League Placement

health update

I was diagnosed with stage 4 prostate cancer in February 2017 and completed four months of chemotherapy in late July and will continue to have hormone treatment.

The cancer spread in the bones but it has been stabilized and has not spread further.

I am still recovering from some of the side effects of the chemo treatment - it's mainly severe fatigue and exhaustion.

Stage 4 cancer is not curable so I will continue to have cat scans and bone scans every four months to ensure the cancer is not spreading.

It is as it is - these things happen - and I will do my very best under the circumstances.

Ed Harrison

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